Humanities and the Arts

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Context Informing the Adoption of Regional Security Initiatives for the Control of Small Arms and Light Weapons in East Africa
(East African Nature and Science Organization, 2025-03-10) Meme, Isaac Mwenda; Muoka, Boniface; Wekesa, Peter
The proliferation of SALWs in the East African region has negatively impacted both national and regional security. Porous and expansive borders, corruption, and instability in the region, commercialization of cattle rustling, weak governments and the presence of ungoverned spaces in the region, have facilitated the proliferation of SALWs in the region. This article presents the findings on the initiatives adopted by Kenya and Uganda, both individually and collaboratively for the control of the proliferation of SALWs in East Africa. The study was guided by the regionalism theory of inter-state cooperation and a descriptive survey design. The sampled respondents totalling 55 were drawn from the security agencies, members of civil societies, foreign relation offices, non-state actors and religious leaders. Instrumentation encompassed questionnaires, focus group discussions and interviews. The findings indicate the context that entails armed robberies, cattle rustling, and conflicts between communities and in urban areas like Nairobi, illegal firearms can be purchased relatively cheaply. Similarly, SALWs are used by various non-state actors, including rebel groups and criminal gangs, which exacerbates instability and hampers peace efforts. This context forms a critical need for comprehensive strategies that address the SALW proliferation, enhance regional collaboration, and improve public awareness to effectively mitigate the associated security threats. The study recommends that the governments of Kenya and Uganda should enhance the recruitment, training, and deployment of sufficient security troops to the Northeast of Uganda and the Northwestern region of Kenya
Conflict Management and Resolution in Uganda: A case of Ntungamo District Local Government
(East African Nature and Science Organization, 2024-08-31) Nimusima, Kakwengo Tadius
The study focused on conflict management on resolution in Ntungamo District Local Government. Specifically to identify the influence of arbitration on resolution, to examine the influence of negotiation on resolution and to examine the influence of confrontation on resolution in Ntungamo District Local Government. The research used case study design. The study used purposive random sampling to select documents in the study that helped to gather detailed information on conflict resolution. The data study used secondary source of data collection with the sample size of 6 articles were considered. Data was analysed using content analysis for qualitative data. The study found out that local council courts were established to bring justice nearer to the people. The grading of the courts is based on the administrative units created by the local Government Act (Cap 243). Every village, parish, sub county and division/town councils is established as a local council court according to Local councils Courts Act. The law establishes local courts for the administration of Justice at local levels, defines their jurisdictional powers and procedures. The study also found out that LCs are viewed as popular organs created to counter and hold in check abuses of the civil servants and all other state functionaries. The study recommends that Ntungamo Local Government actors should be capacitated with the skills and knowledge to manage conflict is a proactive measure that will support their efforts to prevent and mitigate conflicts that may arise in these increasingly densely populated urban environments
Factors Influencing Recentralization of Local Government Functions in Uganda
(East African Nature and Science Organization, 2024-01-12) Biryomumeisho, Stephen; Ocan, Johnson; Adyanga, Francis Akena
The decentralisation system of governance is perceived as one of the recent public sector reforms to improve service delivery in Uganda. It is the transfer of authority from Central to Local Governments to execute their duties to improve service delivery. Various developing countries have praised Uganda’s decentralisation policy regarding the magnitude of the transfer of authority to the local level. However, since 2003, the Central Government started reversing the policy in terms of : recentralization of the appointment of Chief Administrative Officers and Municipal Town Clerks and of recent City Town Clerks (for new cities in Uganda) from the District Service Commissions (DSCs) to the Public Service Commission, recentralization of Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA) under the management of the Executive Director, Procurement of drugs from the district health office to the National Medical Stores (NMS), recentralization of the payroll and the recent recentralization of local revenue collection from LGs. This paper focuses on the factors influencing the recentralization of Local Government powers in Uganda. This is presumed to be evidence of the demise of decentralisation policy. From the reviewed articles, these factors include: accountability challenges, human resource management crisis, political interference by local authorities and lack of financial discipline among local authorities and fear of local autonomy. The paper concluded that recentralisation of Local Government functions reduced undue influence of local politicians though it accorded excessive powers to executive officers in Local Governments; human resource crisis was mainly caused by poor man power planning. Recentralisation of local revenue caused financial constraints at the local level and recentralisation of KCCA led to the weakening of the opposition but led to increases resources to develop the capital city. The paper recommended that the Parliament should harmonise with the central government on the issue of returning Local revenue collection and management at the local level; give reasonable powers to the local Governments to control top technical leadership; increase funding to Central Government staff to monitor Local Government programs and build the capacity of local leaders to improve service delivery
Overview of the African Human Rights and Justice System
(East African Nature and Science Organization, 2025-04-02) Barigayomwe, Rogers
This thesis examines the African Human Rights and Justice System, focusing on the mechanisms established to promote and protect human rights on the continent. It provides a comprehensive overview of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights (ACHPR), which represents the foundational legal framework for human rights in Africa. The research details the roles of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights and the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights, exploring their functions, challenges, and the impact of their actions on human rights protections. The research methodology was a qualitative analysis of legal documents, case studies, and reports from human rights organizations, this study identifies significant gaps in enforcement mechanisms and the implementation of human rights laws. Moreover, the thesis highlights the historical context of human rights in Africa, emphasizing the effects of colonialism and the need for a concerted effort to eradicate its remnants for genuine human rights realization. The findings suggest that while substantial frameworks exist, effective operationalization remains hindered by political, social, and economic factors. The study concludes with recommendations for strengthening the African Human Rights and Justice System, including enhancing the capacity of the existing institutions, fostering greater accountability, and encouraging civil society participation. This research contributes to the ongoing discourse on human rights in Africa and aims to provide a foundation for future reforms in the regional justice system
Effect of Refugee Influx on the Right to Health of Refugees in Nakivale Settlement Camp in Uganda
(East African Nature and Science Organization, 2025-03-20) Barigayomwe, Rogers; Dusabimana, Yvette
This study investigates the effect of refugee influx on the right to health of refugees in the Nakivale settlement camp in Uganda. Utilizing a cross-sectional case study design, the research surveyed a sample of 158 refugees from a target population of 260. Data was collected through questionnaires, interviews, focus group discussions, and document reviews. The results indicate that while the refugee influx has positively impacted certain aspects of the healthcare system—such as the construction of new health facilities and the provision of hospital beds—significant challenges remain. Specifically, maternal health and access to essential medicines have suffered, highlighting a negative impact on the overall right to health. The correlation analysis revealed a strong relationship (r = 0.76, p < 0.05) between refugee influx and health outcomes, affirming the hypothesis that refugee influx significantly affects health rights. Furthermore, regression analysis showed that factors related to refugee influx account for 63.5% of the variance in health service delivery. The study underscores the necessity for improved coordination, policy formulation, and resource allocation to enhance refugee health services. Recommendations include integrating health services for refugees and local populations, improving health financing, and promoting continuity of care, particularly for vulnerable groups. Addressing these issues is crucial for ensuring equitable access to health services in the context of growing refugee populations.
Effect of Judicial Decisions on Child Rights Protection in Mityana Municipality
(East African Nature and Science Organization, 2025-03-13) Barigayomwe, Rogers; Asiimwe, Lillian
This study investigates the effect of judicial decisions on child rights protection in Mityana Municipality, Uganda, amidst evolving legal frameworks and persistent systemic challenges. Utilizing a mixed-methods approach, including quantitative surveys and qualitative interviews with key stakeholders, the research examines how judicial outcomes influence the safeguarding of children's rights. Data analysis reveals a strong positive correlation (Pearson correlation coefficient of 0.742) between judicial decisions and the effectiveness of child rights protection. Furthermore, linear regression analysis indicates that approximately 55.1% of the variance in child rights protection can be explained by judicial decisions, with a significant predictor coefficient of 0.637 (p < 0.001). Despite the robust legal framework provided by the Constitution and the Children Act, the study identifies critical gaps in implementation, exacerbated by inadequate training for judicial officers and socio-economic barriers. The findings underscore the necessity for reforms, including the establishment of specialized child rights courts and enhanced stakeholder engagement. This research contributes to the discourse on child rights protection in Uganda, offering actionable insights for policymakers aimed at strengthening judicial processes and fostering an environment where children's rights are prioritized.
Sustainable Development and Sovereign Debt: A Legal Perspective on Debt Sustainability for Africa
(East African Nature and Science Organization, 2025-02-03) Nattabi, Patricia Kirumira
The World Bank’s 2023 Debt Sustainability Analysis (DSA) puts twelve low-income countries (LICs) in Africa at a high risk of debt distress while six are in debt distress. The recurring unsustainable debt in Sub-Saharan Africa has had a long-standing effect on the pace of development, as measures taken to accommodate debt resolution have often had a counter-effect on economic performance, as investment in development priorities and the social welfare of citizens have often taken a back seat to debt servicing. The United Nations 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda and its implementation Action plans address unsustainable debt as a major obstacle to achieving sustainable development and therefore highlight the importance of supporting poverty eradication by filling the financial gap and encouraging coordinated assistance in developing countries to attain long-term debt sustainability through relief, restructuring, and financing. However, there is a need to clarify the norms underlying sustainability principles and ground them in law to create stronger frameworks for certainty, legitimacy, and effectiveness in their application to Africa’s sovereign debt problems. This research analyses the arguments for a sustainable development approach to improving debt sustainability in Africa, by relating the state responsibilities and obligations within the sustainable development norms in international law and those responsibilities accruing to creditors and sovereign debtors. It analyses these aspects with three emergent norms of international law, sustainable development, shared responsibility, and debt sustainability, and provides a correlation with the socio-economic, environmental, and governance dimensions of sustainable development. The research finds that neglecting the coherence of these aspects in African debt strategies not only increases vulnerability for debt crisis but also prolongs recovery, thereby slowing the progress towards sustainable development.
Posts without ‘Functions’: A review of Article 180(5) of the Constitution of Kenya 2010 on the Position of Deputy Governors
(East African Nature and Science Organization, 2022-12-07) Osanan, Bruno Oksiba
Article 180(5) of the Constitution of Kenya 2010 provides that each candidate for election as a county governor shall nominate a person who qualifies for election as a county governor as a candidate for deputy governor. But almost twelve years after the implementation of the Constitution of Kenya 2010, questions have arisen not only on the importance of these positions but also on whether there is a need to amend the Constitution to provide for clear and substantive functions of deputy governors or even scrap off these positions altogether. To address this dilemma, this paper will begin by exploring the constitutional duties of the deputy governors. The paper will then conduct a comparative analysis of the Kenyan county governance structure and South African provincial governance structures before then critically analysing the five functions enlisted in section 32 of the County Government Act 2012. In moving from a theoretical analysis to a practical analysis of the situation, the paper will finalise by looking into case studies involving the resignation of the former Deputy Governor of Nairobi County, Paulcarp Igathe, and the ‘absence in office’ of the West Pokot’s Deputy Governor, Nicholas Owon Atudonyang. In summary, the paper finds that constitutionally, the critical mandates of the deputy governor include deputising the Governor, filling the vacancy in cases of vacancy in the Governor’s office, and promoting inclusivity in the county. However, there are still numerous gaps in the Constitution, such as the failure to fill the vacancy in the deputy governor’s office and the lack of procedure for removing the deputy governor’s office. Having been enacted after the adoption of the Constitution of Kenya 2010, it was legitimately expected that the enactment of the County Government Act 2012 will at least address these gaps. Unfortunately, a critical analysis of section 32 of the County Government Act shows that all the enlisted functions in the aforementioned provision are merely a repetition of what is provided by the Constitution, or whatever has been enlisted as functions are fundamentally inconsequential for lack of clarity and substance
The Malabo Protocol: A Panacea for Crimes Prevention in Africa?
(East African Nature and Science Organization, 2022-09-05) Barigayomwe, Rogers; Gary, Prevost
The study provides a critical review of selected articles contained in the Malabo Protocol. The protocol, which provides an amendment to the protocol on the Statute of the African Court of Justice and Human Rights is one of eight legal instruments adopted by African Union (AU) leaders on 27 June 2014, but undoubtedly one of its most significant. The protocol established the criminal section of the African Court and outlined a list of fourteen crimes under the jurisdiction of the Court with the aim of forestalling crimes in Africa. If the Court gets the 15 ratifications needed to enter into force, it will be able to investigate and prosecute international, transnational, and other crimes through its three separate chambers and jurisdictions. The Court is poised to introduce a novelty development in the international legal system by having three chambers into a single court with a common set of judges.
Security and Fragility of Tenure of Public Servants within the Legal Framework in Uganda
(East African Nature and Science Organization, 2022-06-27) Kimuraheebwe, John Mary Vianney; Atibuni, Dennis Zami; Manyiraho, Deborah
This conceptual paper examines the security and fragility of tenure of public servants in Uganda within the established legal and policy frameworks. The conceptualisation involved a systematic literature review of the 1995 Constitution of the Republic of Uganda, as amended, together with a host of other principal and subsidiary legislation that provides for the security of tenure of public servants in Uganda. Other primary sources such as court cases and secondary sources such as policy documents, relevant articles, and reviews were also reviewed. The paper reveals that despite its strength due to its robustness, the labour law of Uganda has gaps which, in addition to the manner of its coordination and implementation, potentially and actually generates both positive and negative expectations and outcomes for the public officers in relation to their security of tenure at the workplace. In this paper, we argue that a fair implementation of the law guarantees tenure security while unfair implementation of it predisposes the public officers to a fragile and insecure tenure. We also suggest strategies that can be employed to avert tenure fragility and enhance tenure security to foster the socioeconomic transformation of the civil servants and the country as a whole
Two Africas? Two Ugandas? An African "Democratic Developmental State"? Or Another "Failed" State
(Aalborg Universitet, 2004) Shaw, Timothy M.
Uganda's dramatic redevelopment over the last decade should undermine ready stereotypes of the continent's exponential decline/anarchy. Yet this growth has not been uniformly experienced in terms of different regions & classes. This study applies the concept proposed by Thandika Mkandawire (2001) to the case of Uganda, recognizing that it was formulated with two particular micro-states in mind - Botswana & Mauritius. Since 1990, Uganda has transcended an unenviable history of decline & trauma to advance reconstruction & African (HIPC?) governance. Four decades after formal independence, the Ugandan case illustrates the familiar pattern of a few winners & many losers, yet some gains are more widely distributed than others; for example, UHT milk & cell-phones versus the traumas of HIV/AIDS, street children/soldiers & orphans etc. Meanwhile, fresh produce & forex transfers from diasporas come to balance traditional 'colonial' commodities as sources of export revenue, augmented by invisible, informal, often illegal, income from the Congo. In short, the pattern of human development/rights/security in Uganda is uneven as most analyses, including the invaluable UNDP HDR for Uganda, indicate. Meanwhile, what are the implications for comparative analyses/policies/practices arising from this novel African case?
The right to ‘unlove’: The constitutional case for no-fault divorce in Uganda
(African Human Rights Law Journal, 2021) Kabumba, Busingye
This article examines the constitutionality of the requirement to establish certain grounds - adultery, cruelty, desertion, bigamy and others - as a condition for the grant of divorce in Uganda. It begins with an examination of the existing legal framework, including reforms already achieved through public interest litigation, and certain changes sought to be effected via judicial activism. The article then proceeds to an analysis of the human rights issues implicated by a fault-based framework, and a consideration as to whether the public interest-based limitations in this regard pass constitutional muster. Ultimately, it is proposed that the only means of aligning this area of domestic relations law with the Constitution is through the elimination of fault as a requirement for dissolving marital bonds. Such reform would also be consistent with critical public policy concerns, including the welfare of children and the sanctity of marriage itself.
Preventing Change and Protecting the Regime: Crime Preventers, Local Livelihoods, and the 2016 Ugandan Elections
(JSRP Paper, 2016) Tapscott, Rebecca
In Uganda's 2016 national election, international and national commentators raised questions about the role that the government’s Crime Preventer Programme would play. Many claimed that they would be used “as tools” to rig the elections, intimidate voters, and be manipulated into a voting block for the ruling NRM regime. Based on over 250 interviews and eight months of ethnographic fieldwork between February 2014 and February 2016, this paper presents a study of the Crime Preventer Programme in Gulu District, examining how it developed from a seemingly innocuous community policing programme into a tool to recruit a valuable segment of the population that might otherwise have been a strong supporter of the Opposition. In particular, I ask why the government fostered a program that connected unemployed, marginalized and disenfranchised youth, who theoretically could have used their newfound organization to challenge the state, whether through votes or violence. I examine specific instances when Gulu District’s Crime Preventers were mobilized to support overtly political ends, such as altering the voter registration list and blocking movement of Opposition candidates. I use these anecdotes to analyse why youth participated while posing neither a threat to the government, nor inspiring a meaningful backlash from the Opposition. I find that—despite low and unpredictable rewards and high social and psychological cost of supporting a government that many Acholis find reprehensible—the high rate of participation in Crime Preventers and obedience to state authorities can be explained through the militarization of Uganda’s neo-patrimonial system and the concomitant securitization of livelihoods.
Linking perspectives: a field experiment on the role of multi-layer networks in refugee information sharing
(Springer International Publishing, 2024-12) Clark, Aaron Thomas;; Larson, Jennifer M.;; Lewis, Janet I.
The social networks that interconnect groups of people are often “multi-layered”—comprised of a variety of relationships and interaction types. Although researchers increasingly acknowledge the presence of multiple layers and even measure them separately, little is known about whether and how different layers function differently. We conducted a field experiment in twelve villages in rural Uganda that measured real multi-layer social networks and then tracked their use in response to new, discussion-provoking information about refugees. We find that people who received our information treatment discussed refugees with more people, selected discussion partners from neighbors in the multi-layer network, and used most of the layers to do so. Treatment kicked off conversations throughout the villages that also included control respondents; treated and control both selected discussion partners from their networks who shared their attitudes towards refugees and were particularly interested in the subject. Our results point to multi-layer networks of day-to-day interactions as a source of prospective discussion partners when new information arises, especially layers based on shared meals, homestead visits, and money borrowing. When a relationship is based on multiple of these layers, it is even more likely to facilitate discussion. Furthermore, the selection of discussion partners from these networks depends less on any one particular layer and more on characteristics of the tie relative to the topic at hand. Publicly Available Content Database
The State, Civil Society and Democracy in Uganda
(American Research Journal of Humanities & Social Science (ARJHSS), 2019) Kansiime, Noel Kiiza
Despite increased importance and value, the civil society in the developing world has lagged behind their counterparts in the developed world in terms of performing expected functions and providing checks and balances to the central governments. In Uganda, the basic descriptive information about civil society, its size, area of activity, domestic sources of monetary and material support, and the policy framework in which it operates seem not to be available in an organized way. Civil society (CSOs) structures seem to be superficial and are shadows of the ideal concept of civil society because some of the actors have been compromised, deterred by state while others side with government when they are supposed to provide checks and balances or to promote African Charter on Democracy, Elections, and Governance (ACDEG). Therefore, this article seeks to examine the evolution and role of civil society in Uganda; how the state relates with civil society; factors that influence State-CSOs relationship in the area of advocacy and democracy and whether the theoretical concept of civil society is applicable in Uganda.
Principles of Research Ethics: A Research Primer for Low- and Middle-Income Countries
(African Journal of Emergency Medicine, 2020-10-23) Bittera, Cindy C.; Ngabirano, Annet Alenyo; Simon, Erin L.; Taylor, David McD.
Ethical oversight in the form of review boards and research ethics committees provide protection for research subjects as well as guidance for safe conduct of studies. As the number of collaborative emergency care research studies carried out in low- and middle-income countries increases, it is crucial to have a shared understanding of how ethics should inform choice of study topic, study design, methods of obtaining consent, data management, and access to treatment after closure of the study. This paper describes the basic principles of Western research ethics – respect for persons, beneficence, and justice - and how the principles may be contextualized in different settings, by researchers of various backgrounds with different funding streams. Examples of lapses in ethical practice of research are used to highlight best practices.
Building Text and Speech Benchmark Datasets and Models for Low-Resourced East African Languages: Experiences and Lessons
(Applied AI Letters,, 2025-03-26) Nakatumba-Nabende, Joyce; Nabende, Peter; Mukiibi, Jonathan; Mutebi, Chodrine; Katumba, Andrew
Africa has over 2000 languages; however, those languages are not well represented in the existing natural language processing ecosystem. African languages lack essential digital resources to effectively engage in advancing language technologies. There is a need to generate high-quality natural language processing resources for low-resourced African languages. Obtaining high-quality speech and text data is expensive and tedious because it can involve manual sourcing and verification of data sources. This paper discusses the process taken to curate and annotate text and speech datasets for five East African languages: Luganda, Runyankore-Rukiga, Acholi, Lumasaba, and Swahili. We also present results obtained from baseline models for machine translation, topic modeling and classification, sentiment classification, and automatic speech recognition tasks. Finally, we discuss the experiences, challenges, and lessons learned in creating the text and speech datasets.
IrokoBench: A New Benchmark for African Languages in the Age of Large Language Models
(arXiv preprint arXiv, 2024-06-05) Adelani, David Ifeoluwa; Zhuang, Jian Yun; Ochieng, Millicent; Mukiibi, Jonathan; Kabongo, Salomon; Stenetorp, Pontus
Despite the widespread adoption of Large language models (LLMs), their remarkable capabilities remain limited to a few high-resource languages. Additionally, many low-resource languages (\eg African languages) are often evaluated only on basic text classification tasks due to the lack of appropriate or comprehensive benchmarks outside of high-resource languages. In this paper, we introduce IrokoBench -- a human-translated benchmark dataset for 17 typologically-diverse low-resource African languages covering three tasks: natural language inference~(AfriXNLI), mathematical reasoning~(AfriMGSM), and multi-choice knowledge-based question answering~(AfriMMLU). We use IrokoBench to evaluate zero-shot, few-shot, and translate-test settings~(where test sets are translated into English) across 10 open and six proprietary LLMs. Our evaluation reveals a significant performance gap between high-resource languages~(such as English and French) and low-resource African languages. We observe a significant performance gap between open and proprietary models, with the highest performing open model, Gemma 2 27B only at 63\% of the best-performing proprietary model GPT-4o performance. In addition, machine translating the test set to English before evaluation helped to close the gap for larger models that are English-centric, such as Gemma 2 27B and LLaMa 3.1 70B. These findings suggest that more efforts are needed to develop and adapt LLMs for African languages.
MasakhaPOS: Part-of-Speech Tagging for Typologically Diverse African Languages
(arXiv preprint arXiv, 2023-05-23) Dione, Cheikh M. Bamba; Nabende, Peter; Mukiibi, Jonathan; Chinedu Uchechukwu; Uchechukwu, Chinedu; Abdullahi, Muhammad; Klakow, Dietrich
In this paper, we present MasakhaPOS, the largest part-of-speech (POS) dataset for 20 typologically diverse African languages. We discuss the challenges in annotating POS for these languages using the UD (universal dependencies) guidelines. We conducted extensive POS baseline experiments using conditional random field and several multilingual pretrained language models. We applied various cross-lingual transfer models trained with data available in UD. Evaluating on the Masakha- POS dataset, we show that choosing the best transfer language(s) in both single-source and multi-source setups greatly improves the POS tagging performance of the target languages, in particular when combined with cross-lingual parameter-efficient fine-tuning methods. Crucially, transferring knowledge from a language that matches the language family and morphosyntactic properties seems more effective for POS tagging in unseen languages.
Machine Translation For African Languages: Community Creation Of Datasets And Models In Uganda
(ICLR, 2022-03-30) Akera, Benjamin; Mukiibi, Jonathan; Naggayi, Lydia Sanyu; Nsumba, Solomon; Mwebaze, Ernest; Quinn, John
Reliable machine translation systems are only available for a small proportion of the world’s languages, the key limitation being a shortage of training and evaluation data. We provide a case study in the creation of such resources by NLP teams who are local to the communities in which these languages are spoken. A parallel text corpus, SALT, was created for five Ugandan languages (Luganda, Runyankole, Acholi, Lugbara and Ateso) and various methods were explored to train and evaluate translation models. The resulting models were found to be effective for practical translation applications, even for those languages with no previous NLP data available, achieving mean BLEU score of 26.2 for translations to English, and 19.9 from English. The SALT dataset and models described are publicly available at https://github.com/SunbirdAI/salt.

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